For more than four years, sex has been nothing but a distant memory. Since the start of the pandemic, I have been trapped at home with my parents. It wasn't bad at first. But after being trapped at home, not able to leave, not able to share in that excitement, I began to lose it. Reddit became the only escape from the four walls of my home and since the start of 2020, it has been my only escape.

Recently, I was able to move out from my parent's oppressive eye. It was a difficult change, but I had to get out. But now I am terrified. This is the first time I've really been alone before. In college I had roommates. When the pandemic started I had three other people in the house. For the first time in my adult life I am truly alone, but the fears are louder than ever. But the absence of sex now preoccupies my everyday life. I have tried to quit Reddit in the past. This is a fairly new account to escape some of the problems that were happening at home before I moved. I thought maybe I would leave behind those old habits, but they are calling for me more than ever.

Each and every day, thoughts of sex invade the mind, growing more persistent, ad more tantalizing. While I managed to not masturbate during the move, now I can't keep my fingers away from my crotch. The longing for that feeling, another man or woman's skin against my skin, has become almost unbearable. But I am afraid now, where I was never scared in the past.

The fear of giving into these terrible thoughts. The fear of someone taking advantage. The fear of someone hurting me. The fear of getting sick. The fear that one taste will reignite long dormant obsessions, and an insatiable desire for more. I don't know what to do. But I am at odds with myself all the time over it, battling my desire to let go with my rational fears of getting sick, hurt, or worse. I have my freedom back, but now I am too petrified to act. What is wrong with me?